LOVE at first sight! How our lives changed in three seconds—literally!

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If there was one thing that added a whole rainbow of color into Elie’s black-or-white view of life, it was when he first set eyes on Marlena and fell in love with her that same second, just as she was falling in love with him.

Read this delightful true story of love at first sight that took place in a city photo-walk event which both lovebirds didn’t want to attend. It’d been a long day and one didn’t like taking photos and the other did not even own a camera!

Isn’t it beautiful how love and destiny orchestrate their little song-and-dance?

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Names: Marlena & Elie

Status: Married

Been together since: 2019

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My gentle awakening.

Marlena: I’d just completed my master’s degree and had returned to my native Germany from Copenhagen. I found that all my peers had automatically adopted the mindset of being grown-ups and were systematically embarking on the sensible path of getting jobs, building up their careers and earning money.

I, on the other hand, had opted for a volunteering job at an NGO, which is something most people do when they are a little bit younger, perhaps fresh out of college. And even stranger, out of all the options available, I’d applied for opportunities in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan or Georgia, the one in Europe, in that order of preference. I would be gone for a whole year.

My choice of opting for those places was not at all rational and I have no idea what put that region on my radar in the first place other than perhaps curiosity about little known post-soviet era countries.

I would be stepping away from the familiarity of Europe, as well as from my boyfriend, whom I’d been with for almost a year at that point. People around me weren’t being that supportive of my decision either and I truly couldn’t explain why I was going ahead with it, other than to say that a strong feeling was telling me I just had to do it.

When it comes to big decisions in life, I have always found that when I don’t listen to my mind and just follow my gut, things actually pan out quite nicely. I knew to trust that. 

That same strong feeling was also saying that I would end up being placed in Georgia and soon this was confirmed. I was to be stationed in Tbilisi, the capital

I said what I thought was a temporary goodbye to my boyfriend in Germany and headed to Georgia for the year. 

The nature of the relationship with my boyfriend was such that we both had fairly busy lives and weren’t living in the same place so we would only catch up on weekends. 

Having such an active tempo was something that I thrived in, something that fueled and fulfilled me, yet I also sensed that I longed for a base, a nest, the kind of existence that would make me say, “I’m home.”

My boyfriend was someone who checked all the boxes, someone that my parents would approve of but since I’d moved to Georgia and had time to experience things from afar, I’d been growing increasingly aware of my unhappiness.

Being long-distance now, all we had was verbal communication and I realized our chats were mostly small talk and fairly superficial. I hadn’t yet realized that this was actually a reflection of the lack of  emotional depth in our relationship and so I was always left with this feeling of deficiency that I just couldn’t pinpoint and transfer from my subconscious into my conscious reasoning.  

Suddenly without the cover of my distraction packed, fast-paced life, the relationship was standing naked right in front of me and I was trying very hard not to look at it lest I had to acknowledge its flaws. Everything fit so well on paper, how could he not be the right one for me? It was a dance of avoidance between me and myself. One of us was bound to get tired.

The bland, arid landscape of that relationship was actually going to be quite important in terms of the contrast it set to all that was to follow when I met Elie, but I had no idea of that at the time.

My explosive awakening.

Elie: My awakening was not so subtle. It was about two and a half years ago and I was living in Lebanon, where I’m from. I was on my laptop studying when my friend Alex dropped by one evening. 

We were having coffee and chit chatting about his girlfriend, his friends and his life in France. I was finishing up on my computer when suddenly, out of absolutely nowhere, a voice popped right into my head and asked, “What are you doing here? What the hell are you doing here?”

I sat there casually carrying on my conversation with Alex as I quietly responded to this fantom voice in my head, “I’m about to finish my degree in business and management, I also just finished my studies in psychology and I’m working while I’m preparing to go to the UK for my masters degree… And what the hell?!”

But there it was again—the same voice, the same question, “What the hell are you doing here?”

I’d been meditating regularly for about five years at that point so my senses were rather open. My mind silently responded, “Well, what should I be doing?”

The voice said, “Get the hell out of here!”

Wow! 

I told Alex I needed to go to the bathroom. 

I went to the bathroom in a daze, shut the door and splashed some water on my face. As I slowly raised my head, I caught a reflection of myself in the mirror… and I could not recognize myself! The face staring back at me was a stranger to me!

I was out of breath. 

What in the world was happening to me? 

I went back to the room, downed my coffee, closed my laptop and I said, “Alex, listen, no more!” 

He said, “Yeah, funny! What do you mean ‘no more’?”

I said, “No, no more! No more study and no more work—I’m traveling! That’s it!” 

I opened up my to-do list. 

What was on my list? 

Yoga and meditation teacher training. 

Bingo! That’s what I was going to do! 

What’s the country that it comes from? 

India! 

Okay, let’s go to India. Done! 

I booked everything, saved as much money as much as I could, said goodbye to life as I’d known it and the next thing I know, I was in India doing my yoga teacher training. 

India was a huge culture shock for me but being very adaptable by nature, I was fully open to embracing their ways, immersing myself in their ancient wisdom and living as they did. It was the start of the most amazing life-changing, mind-opening experience for me.

By the time my training was over, something profound had shifted within me. I always say that my trip to India is the chapter of my life in which I consider myself to have been spiritually reborn.

I didn’t want to return to Lebanon, I just couldn’t. I wanted to roam the world teaching yoga and meditation and sharing my story so that people could also open their hearts to their dreams, get out of the system and embrace the world.

Georgia came on my radar as they had just relaxed their visa policies towards many nationalities, including Lebanese citizens. This would allow me to stay there visa-free for a whole year. I thought it was a great idea—new culture, new food, new language, plus it was very affordable! Great, let’s see what they’ve got!

I ended up staying in Georgia for thirteen months, volunteering in eco-villages. 

My volunteer work allowed me to learn about things that I was passionate about, like natural, sustainable living and permaculture. This eventually also led me to Europe doing the same thing. 

I was traveling the world, just as I had dreamed of!

After experiencing a few countries in Europe, I ended up in Turkey. I explored it quite a bit, volunteering again. 

One of the eco-villages was up on a mountain and was very basic. It had no electricity and hardly any internet or WiFi. It provided me with complete isolation in all senses. I stayed there for twenty-two days. We drank the water springing from the land and ate the food supplied by mother earth. I felt very deeply connected to everything during my stay there and this allowed for me to dive deeper into my thoughts. 

As always, I was meditating regularly every morning, every evening, every day, every night. My meditations were revealing to me that I was on the right path. They were also solidifying my vision of what I wanted my future to look like—continuing to live a life in accordance to nature, detached from the system. 

In the picture of my desires was a cob house in the woods, surrounded by the organic food I’d be growing on my land using permaculture practices… but there was something missing in this picture, it was a blind spot that I hadn’t noticed before but I did now—I was longing for a partner to share this journey with me. I was already fulfilled and happy on my own but I would love to share my presence with someone in a mutually nourishing interaction. 

I’d had some girlfriends and various levels of depth in a relationship, as well as one night stands, but they’d all left me feeling unsatisfied. It’s like having your oats in the morning but you’re still yearning for something more, or if you dig deeper, something else. 

I hated the concept of boyfriend and girlfriend. It had never resonated with me. I wanted something more real, more substantial, someone who was shoulder to shoulder, hand in hand with me, a partner who was the other half to my half.

I wouldn’t be leaning on her and she wouldn’t be leaning on me, we would be harmoniously walking along together, side by side.   

I have a great connection with the universe so I declared this and wished for a partner. This wish did not have a flavor of need or necessity, which I find to be the wrong flavoring for such a wish. It was more along the lines of, “I would love to meet her. The One.”  

With that unearthed from my psyche and implanted into the universe, I continued my travels.

I volunteered in a dog shelter in Turkey for a month and had a short relationship there where I experienced  cohabitation for the first time in my life. My soul was asking more questions and the universe was giving me the opportunity to discover the answers within myself. I was able to look at things in an unorthodox light and this enabled me to learn a lot from that experience. 

My time in Turkey was coming to an end and my aim was to do Vipassana, a ten day silent meditation retreat, which was taking place in Armenia in May, about a month later. I actually had many other reasons to go to Armenia besides this retreat. My roots are Armenian and I’d been playing with the idea of setting up an eco-village one day—which was one of the main reasons that I had started volunteering in eco-villages in the first place—and I had people who could help me if I were to do this there. Plus, it’s a great communist country and also very affordable. Anything was possible!

Meanwhile, I had written a book about my travels and was connecting with many people through my website. So although I had no money and was aiming to live moneyless so that I didn’t have to be a part of a system that I didn’t believe in, I did have solid faith in my life journey and knew that I had to take the first step and the universe would guide me to where I was meant to be. 

But until then, in between my time in Turkey and Armenia in May, I had one month to kill. 

Georgia was like a home to me and I thought it would be great to return and spend that month there. Georgia’s nature really is superlative and my plan was to volunteer in an eco-village somewhere in the mountains. But when your plans clash with destiny’s plans, destiny always wins. 

Some of my friends wanted me to visit them in France and it turned out that I needed to apply for a visa in the French embassy and the embassy was in Tbilisi. I’d had no intention or desire to be in a city but my dream of going to the mountains had to be put on hold as I needed to remain in Tbilisi for the back-and-forth needed for the visa.  

It’s really quite hard to get any sort of employment in Georgia but I had to find a way to sustain myself and also needed a roof over my head. One of the things I could do which would enable both of those was to volunteer in a hostel, so that’s what I decided to do. 

I found a hostel in the center of the city. This was quite a big contrast to the mountains and natural living that I had just left behind. 

I hate having WiFi around me and they had two big routers and WiFi blasting everywhere. On top of all that, the atmosphere was quite fake and the conversations suitably superficial. The people there were just looking to get drunk and have sex. That just didn’t do it for me, to say the least. I lasted for eight days and then I said, “That’s enough.” 

I had a friend who had an extra room in his house. I approached him and said, “I barely have enough money so I can’t do a flat share. Would you accept this amount and rent me a room until I go to Armenia in a month?” Would be great if he said okay and no problem at all if he declined, but much to my gratitude, he kindly accepted my very modest budget and I finally had a place to rest my head for that month in Tbilisi.  

Marlena: Although Tbilisi is also a big city like the one I had left behind, it was somehow providing me with the mental space where I was able to detach from the engulfing hustle and bustle and retune and reconnect within. 

I was getting back to my meditation practice. 

I was getting back to myself. 

Elie: Nature, as always, was my way of reconnecting. Although my place for the month was a neighborhood called Saburtalo, a fairly busy part of Tbilisi, it is always very easy to find a park or forest to go to for a hike in any city in Georgia so I kept myself well balanced with regular hikes in the woods.  

It was the sixth of April…

Marlena: It was the sixth of April, about a month after I moved. It had been a particularly rainy morning leaving the afternoon fairly cold. I was meant to be meeting up with somebody whom I knew from a few years back in Vienna who I bumped into in Tbilisi in a crazy coincidence. I spent a few hours with her that afternoon.

Elie: Yes, the sixth of April. Although it was a rainy day, I loved the idea of going for a hike so I headed into the green again. I started in one of the parks then hiked my way up to the top of the mountains and ended up in a misty forest amongst the cedar trees. I was enjoying spending time with myself, welcoming and entertaining my thoughts and just embracing this quality time being mindful. I spent the whole day in nature then slowly made my way back into the city as the day slowly turned into night. 

I was cold and drizzle-wet at this point and looking forward to getting home but I received a message from my friend, the owner of the hostel. It seemed I’d forgotten a scarf there which had sentimental value as it was a memento from my time in India. I told him I’d drop by to pick it up and made my way over.    

I said hello to all the new volunteers, collected my scarf and left. I was really ready to go home now to get dry, get warm and get some rest! 

Finally, home! I hung my jacket up to dry, changed and made myself a nice cup of hot tea. I was sitting in a cosy room next to the kitchen trying to purge the cold out of my system. The day had been very enjoyable but also very long.

Marlena: I, meanwhile, was done catching up with my acquaintance and was feeling quite drained. It was now well into the evening and heading home and getting some rest was really enticing. The only thing holding my tired feet back from heading that way was my friend Nino’s photo walk event which was taking place that night. 

To be honest, I was really not feeling up to going for many reasons: It’d been a really long day, I didn’t have my camera with me, except for the one on my phone, it was already dark, I didn’t feel like walking, and, perhaps more importantly, I wasn’t in the brightest of moods… Should I just go home? Or should I head to the photo walk?

Elie: Just around that time, I would have been browsing Facebook. I had already clicked ‘interested’ on Facebook for Nino’s photo walk event before so it had popped up again on my notifications. It was around half past eight or a quarter to nine, and I was questioning whether I really wanted to quickly pull myself together and rush there. 

I needed to get on the subway, switch and take another connecting train. I really wasn’t sure if I could be bothered or if I had any energy left for anything anymore.

In addition, I didn’t even have a camera. I simply didn’t own one. 

My relationship with my phone is very different than what is the norm and I don’t always carry it with me by default like everyone does, I always had to see how I felt about it. Did I feel like taking my phone with me that night? No, I didn’t. So I wouldn’t even have anything to take photos with at this photo walk event.

Nino seemed like a nice girl but I didn’t know her all that well either… 

Marlena: Another important point that I couldn’t ignore—I don’t even like taking photos! You can see why my motivation to go was so low… 

Elie: What was I to do? 

I took a quick look at the people responding to the event invite. They seemed like a nice, cheerful crowd made up of a lot of expats from different backgrounds. Seemed like they were all going for a photo exhibit and a drink afterwards too. 

Hmmm… 

Marlena: Next to my long mental list of reasons not to go was one simple reason why I should go and it was one that was close to my heart—I really did want to support my sweet friend Nino who was organizing everything. 

That thought trumped everything else! 

I managed to gather the final remnants of my energy and started to make my way over to the event.

Elie: Finally a decision clicked into place for me too.

‘Okay, I’ll just drop by, why not?’ I thought. If they accept me and we mesh well, great. If not, it’ll be a case of thank you very much and goodbye. No problem. 

Two trains and some rushing and walking later, I’d arrived. Nino and a bunch of people were already there so I greeted everyone. We were all standing in a circle and about three minutes later Marlena appeared, breaking into the circle right opposite me.

She stepped forward to give Nino a hug, then stepped back again into that spot right in front of me. 

Now we stood facing each other.

And then I looked at her and she looked at me. 

The second I laid eyes on her, we were both taken somewhere high up into the sky. 

I completely lost myself in her eyes. 

I had never, ever experienced anything like this before, never. 

Marlena: I was similarly entrenched. His eyes they were so bright, they just kept me there.

Elie: She had her head tilted to one side and looked utterly charming. She seemed to be in her own little world. I didn’t know if she was blonde or tall or short or anything else, but I felt her energetic presence very intensely. I was completely engulfed in it. 

I don’t know how long that flight lasted, one or two or three seconds, but we both went all the way up into the sky.

Marlena: It felt longer than three seconds to me.

Elie: It was like a lifetime rolled into three seconds and a whole lifetime to look into her soul but in actual earth-time, it probably was only three seconds. 

Marlena: The feeling of instant recognition was overwhelming. Something in me was saying, “That’s him!”

Elie: I too had a feeling that we had met before. It was like the emotional sensation of bingo! I’m not the Don Juan type. I’m not into flirting and trying. I’m concise and to the point both on the outside and within and this was a moment of pure clarity for me. 

Marlena: I think there was a short introduction but I couldn’t remember anyone else’s name, I just remembered Elie’s. Suddenly there was a shift and we all started walking and then, just like that, we found ourselves next to each other.

Elie: I look to my right and there she is. Normally I don’t care for superficial conversations, “Oh hello, I am Elie, I come from Lebanon…” Don’t give me that stuff!  

Marlena: I too dislike smalltalk. It’s something I’m not very good at. It can’t shed light on what makes a person who they are, what they have done, what they have lived through, what was it that shaped them. So what I asked Elie was, “What brought you here?”

Elie: That literally was the question, “What brought you here?”

We were in front of a mall called the Galleria at this point, a popular spot in Tbilisi. It takes a few minutes to walk from there to Dunkin’ Donuts, which we needed to go past for the photo walk. During those few minutes between those two points, in response to her question, I told Marlena my whole story—why I turned against the system, why I left the system, why I left Lebanon in search of my soul, what I found and what my dreams for my future were.

Her question had triggered a concise summary of everything I was and everything that I stood for and my whole life had been laid out in front of her in one organic flow of words in mere minutes. 

When I was done, she just stood there staring, silent. I said, “Are you stunned or surprised?”

She just said, “Wow.” She seemed to be very deep in thought.

Marlena: Elie opened up so fully, so deeply that it caught me off guard. I would never have thought someone I just met would open up this way and go this deep.

He’d told me about his ideals, about living a moneyless life and how he’d sometimes had to sleep in his tent because of his beliefs. That was what floored me—the honesty in it, the truthfulness, being so straightforward and not disguising any part of his experience, admitting what he’d been going through, especially the part about having to be without a roof over his head sometimes. I was trying to digest everything.

Elie: When you take the decision to step away from the system and live moneyless, you have to be ready to walk the talk and accept all the things that might come with that. Life won’t be so kind and easy on you and you need to face reality and accept it. No one will come to you and say here are a hundred bucks, you have to be realistic.

Marlena: It was not just the openness and the story itself, it was also your congruency—how deeply you believed in everything you were doing and saying, your determination to continue on your path despite the difficulties and how you stood so strong no matter what. Your beliefs and your way of life had so grown into each other, into you, and from that you had the strength to say, ‘so come what may.’ All of this stunned me then and it continues to stun me to this day.  

Elie: I’m generally a very open and expressive person. I have nothing to hide. I’m at peace within and I really love straightforwardness and honesty, so just say it as it is. I’d been traveling for two years as a backpacker with the purpose of opening my eyes, mind and heart to the world and I’m not quite the type to filter myself anyway. If someone asks me what is your truth? I will tell them everything in minutes without worrying about how I’m coming across, I don’t quite give a damn, to be honest.

And if I ever make a mistake, I have no qualms about acknowledging it and saying I’m sorry. If I mess up, I will embrace the consequences. Fair!

For me, living like this makes life easier but it sometimes is not quite so for others as I bring complications to them—not everyone is comfortable with the truth. But this is how I live and how I am. 

I had poured everything out there now. And she was downloading it bit by bit, processing everything little by little. 

If you play tennis, you know a part of the game is trying to figure out the technique of the person you’re playing with. If you know how I play and you play the same way, you will not lose the ball. So I had thrown the ball at her and she had managed to match my vibration and had given it right back to me. Bam! 

At this point the rest of the group had caught up with us so we turned to say hello to them. We continued walking down the main road doing the usual superficial zig zag conversations with people that you’re just getting to know. 

Marlena: But we always ended up next to each other again. 

Elie: Just like two magnets. 

Marlena: And we were always no further than a few meters away from each other at any given point.

Elie: I always had her in the corner of my eye, keeping an eye on her.

Marlena: An eye, as well as an ear too!  

Elie: As did she. And every time we broke away, we would return and our conversation would continue to flow like it had never stopped.

Marlena: It was in the very deep connection that we had, we were in complete sync with each other.

Some time later, our photo walk came to an end. We were now to head to a bar to check out the photo exhibit there and have a drink. Our group dispersed. Some went to catch a ride with Nino and others had marched on to get there on foot. 

Suddenly, there was no one else around. It was just Elie and me. 

We continued walking. 

We reached a place where there was a fountain on one side and lavender bushes on the other.

Elie: I just said to her, “I like this click.”  

Marlena: It was a statement, not a question.

Elie: Definitely not. I was not asking her opinion. I just felt it within, this is it, I’m done. It was a moment of brilliant clarity.

Marlena: Yes, there was this magnetic click, this instantaneous connection. No matter how much I tried to deny it, it was there! The feeling of recognition I was experiencing was uncanny. Was it all in my head? I am way more reserved than Elie so it took me a while there as I allowed myself this acknowledgement.

Elie: I sensed she needed some sort of confirmation so I just stated it there and then went back to myself. 

Marlena: It all came together for me when he said it—I wasn’t imagining it! It was there and it was big and it was something I’d never felt before… I was loving it! 

I can’t remember exactly what I said to you then…

Elie: I do! You had your hands in your jacket pocket and you looked at me and you whispered, “Yeah, I like it too…” but in a very reserved, German kind of way. But behind those few little words was a mountain of emotion and I definitely sensed all that.

When she loosens up, she’s good, but at first she’s always reserved. Unlike me, it was very clear to me—This is it and I’m so done!

Marlena: We continued on to the bar. Everyone was already there, we were one of the last ones to arrive.

Elie: It was quite crowded. Most of the people from our crowd were sitting on one table and the rest of the tables were filled with locals. We found a table for ourselves.

I took a chair and she automatically sat next to me without question or without me having to ask her. I was being myself, she was being herself, we’d found each other and there we were sitting next to each other very willingly, naturally. No games were played.

Then Nino came by and told us that the exhibit was starting so we went to look at the pictures.

When we came back we ended up having to blend on a table full of Georgians as there was nowhere else to sit by then. Marlena and I now ended up sitting directly opposite each other.  

Marlena: It was a huge table and we had a lot of distance between us. It would be very difficult to hear each other so we were having very nice conversations with the people around us.

Elie: Georgians are very hospitable so they were offering us wine. Both Marlena and myself speak a little bit of Georgian and they very much appreciate foreigners trying to speak their language so the atmosphere was great.

When they toast, Georgians don’t do the eye contact thing, it’s not in their culture. I’d learned that from some Russians and she knows it as a German tradition. So when everyone was toasting each other, we raised our glasses at each other.

Marlena: And our eyes just locked.

Elie: And all words disappeared.

Marlena: We had a sip of wine but the eyes, they were communicating on another realm. 

Elie: It was a perfect way to blend.

Marlena: Yes it was, very much so. We couldn’t speak across that huge table but our eyes would not stop communicating.

Elie: We continued to chit chat with those around us. A little later, I turned once again to grab my glass of wine and we had another magical moment.

Marlena: I don’t think I can replicate that move ever again but I picked up my wine and I raised it, but only to him. Everything and everyone else faded away. There was just him and me.

Elie: And she did the same head-tilt that she made when she first saw me. Her eyes were speaking again and they were saying, “I’m here, don’t forget about me. I’m still with you and I’m not leaving without you.” Those were the silent words she was sending me with her eyes. It was a very special moment again just between her and I.

Marlena: Throughout the night, our eyes never stopped talking. 

One goodbye and she slips away.

Marlena: Eventually the night started to come to en end. Slowly people started to leave.

Elie: It was almost midnight and I was a little tired. I thought, “Well, that’s enough.” I’d had enough of the current state of things but in no way had I had enough of Marlena’s company. I really wanted to go somewhere, anywhere, with her. I was hopefully curious as to where this might lead, but without expectations. 

With a few words and gestures to each other, we decided to get up and leave. But when we stood up, so did they rest of our photo walk crowd and we all ended up walking out together.  

Marlena: Yes, trying to get some time alone clearly wasn’t going to happen, so we continued walking with everyone.

Elie: Then she asked me, “So, how long will you stay here before you go to Armenia?” I said, “For a month or so.”

Marlena: I said, “Oh…” 

Elie: At this point, our group had split into two as we were heading to two separate sides of the city. Marlena and I had ended up in separate groups.

Marlena: I said, “Can I have your number?” Something that I normally would never do.  He said, “Yeah.” 

Elie: I said, “What are you up to tomorrow?” 

Marlena: I’d already made plans to visit this ancient monastery in Mtsketa near Tbilisi that next day. 

Elie: And I was to catch up with my friend Mary Ellen anyhow. We’d both made these plans before we met. I said, “Don’t worry, I’m still here. This is my number, write it down anywhere you want. Goodbye.”

I messaged her the next morning saying, “Thank you for a wonderful evening,” and she wrote back saying something along the lines of, “Your presence made it wonderful.” Although we had vaguely alluded to perhaps being able to catch up after she was done with all the things she had to do, I didn’t keep the messaging going sending her one message after another. I said what I had to say then bye. I’m relaxed. 

I knew she was going to be quite a bit on the reserved side and she would never take any crap either. 

Marlena: At that point you didn’t know the reason—that I was still officially in a relationship.

Elie: I had no idea. She didn’t tell me and I didn’t even think to ask because of what I saw in her eyes. They had told me all night that there was no one else. And all in all, we had spoken less than thirty minutes at that point.

So we didn’t end up catching up the next day, which was expected, but what did surprise me was that she kept me on ‘pending’ mode a lot, which is something I really dislike. Of course, I still didn’t know that she was dating someone else so it didn’t make sense to me after how we’d connected. 

If I messaged her in the morning, I could see that my messages had reached her phone. Perhaps she couldn’t read them at work during the day, which was possible, but in the evening when you’re home or  having dinner, there is no reason to not look at them. And, when those messages remained unread even the day after, that didn’t quite make sense to me. What is the silent message you are trying to send me then? 

Marlena: Yes, I did put him on pending mode a lot but it was not intentional and definitely not because I was indifferent. On the contrary, since I’d met Elie, I felt that I’d lost my bearings and was all over the place. I had to figure out who I’d just met and what all these feelings I now had meant. In line with that, I’d embarked on a mission of researching all that I could on love and soulmates and understand how these things worked.

On the other hand, I was also trying to assess how things were with my boyfriend and could see that things just hadn’t been working out. I simply wasn’t happy and hadn’t been so for a while. I was still trying to come to grips with having to admit to myself how unfulfilled I’d been feeling and it was tough.

I had a conversation with him and spoke to him on a level that we had never spoken in before. I asked him if he believed in soulmates. Trying to talk to him about something that had any kind of depth just was not possible. We were so lacking in that aspect that we couldn’t even have a conversation about it. The connection just wasn’t there at all. I was turning to him to help me search for something that I couldn’t yet define, something that I felt was missing between us and the only thing that I was discovering was even more emptiness. 

I was realizing that my attraction towards him was that everything checked out on paper and was picture-perfect—he was very connected to nature, was a responsible person with a stable job, and just fit all the criteria that someone normal would go for. And I didn’t want to admit to myself that I am not looking for something normal.

I’d been meditating for years and this was something that I held very dear to me. I had never shared this thing that was such an important part of my life with him and he had never cared enough to inquire about things that made me tick. This was already a red flag on both counts but I’d completely ignored it. 

Meanwhile, on the other hand I just couldn’t help but notice how different things were with Elie. Although we’d only just met, everything about him—our connection, our conversations, that surreal click we both felt—everything was so palpable, so incredibly real. It wasn’t just a casual crossing of paths, there was so much more substance to it. If we summed it up, Elie and I probably had only spent a total of thirty minutes in conversation that night that we met, yet I could already sense the authenticity and significance of what transpired between us… 

Still, no matter what my confusing roller-coaster questioning and reasoning sessions were revealing, the fact remained that I was officially with someone else and things were too overwhelming for me to process all at once. Another minor detail was that I prefer meeting people and seeing them face to face rather than messaging them.

In addition to all of these confronting internal awakenings that were dawning on me, there were other practical matters that I was trying to navigate everyday—I was new at work and still trying to adjust to everything there as well as trying to assimilate myself into the ways of a brand new country and culture.

And that’s why I was torn between answering and not answering Elie anytime he messaged me and why my responses were so slow and sporadic. But that was soon to change.

How can awful be wonderful?

Marlena: One of the things Elie and I had discussed when we met was the market near the main train station in Tbilisi. This was a bustling bazaar with all sorts of local vendors selling spices, fruits, vegetables, home-made wine, second hand clothing and electronics plus anything and everything else one can think of.

Elie had mentioned what a special place it was and how he always went there to buy his wine and vegetables.

I was extremely interested in going and had only been in Tbilisi for one month so he offered to take me there anytime but we hadn’t put a date or time on it. It was a vague plan.

I can’t remember if he proposed it or if I led the conversation towards going to the market but we ended up messaging about it.

Elie: I told myself, “Well, if she’s not going to do anything, you have to take the lead!” 

So I texted her in the morning and said, “How about I take you to the bazaar in the morning, we buy a few things and then go for a picnic at Lisi Lake?”

I’d seen that when I messaged her in the morning, the reply arrived in the evening or if I messaged her in the evening, the reply came in the morning so I knew not to expect a quick few-hour turn around.

Marlena: I got his message. There were so many voices and opinions about what I should do. I was under a lot of influence from a lot of people, not to mention my inner debate with my conscience around what would be right or wrong. 

I was so curious about Elie and all that he had triggered within me. Who was this person? What did it all mean? What would happen if we just went to the market? 

I finally responded that evening saying, “That would be awfully wonderful. Yes, I would love to.”

Elie: It was late for me and I was getting ready to wind down. My usual routine was to do my meditation then sleep around 9 pm. 

I received her message. 

My mind was sleepy, I didn’t have my glasses on and my vision was blurry. 

I have an old-fashioned Samsung phone which only displays the first few words of any message as a preview. To see the full message you actually have to click on it. So when I received her message, all I could see in the preview pane through my sleepy eyes was, “That would be awfully w…”

“Oh, okay,” I thought, “This isn’t gonna work. I should have finished that first night with her, maybe had a one night stand, and then forget about it. I’ll probably delete her contact details tomorrow. I was probably mistaken, she’s not a fit for me. That’s it, done!” 

I put my phone on airplane mode and went to meditate and sleep. 

I woke up the next day. It was Thursday and I had a very busy day ahead. I went through my usual routine: breakfast, yoga, meditation—always so good! 

It was after that, around 10 am, that I checked my phone. 

I clicked on her message and that’s when the full message was revealed to me: 

That would be awfully wonderful. Yes, I would love to.

I beg your pardon, what?! 

For me it was a closed case already, finished! I’d already clicked delete on her mentally. 

Awfully wonderful? What kind of English was that? 

Marlena: Awfully wonderful, terribly beautiful—I use paradoxes on a regular basis. It’s just something I do.

Elie: I quickly rearranged all of my plans and cancelled the Russian lesson I had in the evening too for good measure.

Marlena: I had no idea that he’d done that but I’d done the same thing—rearranged my day to see him.

Elie: The messages were flowing now! When can you make it? Four is okay… Great! Liberty Square? Okay… 

Oh my God, it’s working! We agreed to meet up at 4 o’clock instead of in the morning and that was it.

I said to myself, “Okay, this is not a date but you are going out with her so just be yourself and let her accept you the way you truly are in all that you are—the way you think, the way you speak, the way you practice life.” 

I wasn’t about to change myself for anyone—and nobody should—I was a take me or leave me kind of package.

My favorite clothes are those that would definitely not be acceptable for any kind of meeting in society’s norms, not at all! Still, I put them on. 

Marlena: You were wearing your favorite ‘t-shirt.’

Elie: My favorite t-shirt is kind of torn. It’s not appropriate for any occasion but I love it.

Marlena: I don’t think it should even be called a t-shirt because it is not.

Elie: I guess technically it’s not a t-shirt.

Marlena: Ripped… I’ve been raised to be respectful towards others, plus who am I to judge someone else’s appearance? If he’s happy, I’m happy, so I didn’t comment. I do have to admit though, I’m very happy that t-shirt never got to see another summer this year.

Elie: We said hello and headed off to the bazaar to this one shop that I’d been going to for a year and a half now. The sweet old ladies there knew me very well.

Marlena: It was actually a very awkward situation that followed.

Elie: I’ve brought my friends there before but this was a different situation and they felt it. We exchanged the usual Russian-Geogian pleasantries then all attention was focused on her.

Lamazia gogo they were saying, beautiful girl. Then they said deda meaning mother and started making gestures of cradling an imaginary baby.

It was the first time that we were going out, and I wasn’t even sure if this was a date, and this is what was going on. I could tell she was really embarrassed and I was trying to explain to them, “Look it’s the second time I’ve ever seen her, I don’t know.”

They kept saying khorosho khorosho meaning good, good in Russian, all of them nodding in agreement.

“I don’t know if she’s khorosho or not, wait, I just met her!”

Marlena: All of them were saying it, all of them! There was so much attention on me.

Then everyone was asking me questions—where are you from, what do you do here, what’s your name? Then they added, “He’s a good guy! You look after him now, take care of him.” 

Elie: Being under a huge spotlight, getting bombarded with comments and questions and being very reserved by nature, she actually handled it quite well.

Marlena: All the while Elie was filling up the wine bottle and I was just standing there trying to answer best as I could.

Elie: People have different states and categories and those ladies could feel that. They sensed the other people were strictly in the ‘just friends’ category but now it felt like they were thinking, “Oh, you brought your other half. This is your match and it shows that the heart is complete now.” 

With all our provisions in place, we took the bus to Lisi lake. That was where I asked her about something that is very important to me: food. What do you eat? How do you eat it?

Marlena: Well, you were testing.

Elie: Well, I was.

Marlena: In the grand scheme of things, the space that food occupies in a relationship is very important to me. I have always valued and loved preparing food together. It is a bonding experience for me, it’s the place for conversations and discussions to take place. It is an essential daily ritual and you dedicate time to it everyday. 

Elie: And you put your energy into it.

Marlena: And you value what you eat. Back then, I was a vegetarian and I was slowly inching towards veganism. I would have dairy products every now and again, but very little. It was decreasing more and more. Elie was asking me about meat specifically and I was giving him the standard answer that I gave everyone.

Elie: It was a very typical German answer, “If I know the source of the meat, I’ll eat it. But I won’t if I don’t. I don’t eat commercial meat.”  I was thinking, ‘No, that doesn’t work! You must have more awareness.’

Marlena: Yes, that was a pretty important discussion for us in the bus and my responses were very important to Elie. Then we got off the bus and started walking towards the lake and it was my turn to start testing. 

I was intentionally asking questions that were very deep and open which would reveal a lot about him to me. These questions would probably be considered very private, very personal by anyone else. 

Elie: Yes, you normally wouldn’t ask someone these were the kinds of questions on your first meeting but we’d had no barriers with each other from the get-go and had never stooped to superficial, inconsequential conversations from the start so it didn’t feel out of place at all. 

Marlena: My questions were also very future-oriented. I hadn’t pre-planned these questions except for a few. The rest flowed out very organically and were getting more and more candid.

Elie would have to open up more and talk about what he was looking for in life so that I get to know him. I felt that this would also be a very enlightening experience for me so that I could get a little more clarity about what I wanted too and find my way out of this confusing smog I was in.

I was getting very long, very detailed responses to my questions.

Elie: The more detailed my answers were, the more elaborate her questions became.

Marlena: At the start of our hike in the park, he was telling me what he was looking for in a partner. He said that he isn’t looking for someone, he’s looking for something, something that is mutual. Everything had to be on a mutual basis.

Elie: Like an equal partnership.

Marlena: That really touched my heart because I knew deep down inside, that was exactly what I wanted. It was exactly what I was looking for—the mutuality of things, the equality from within. I thought wow! 

I’m not sure whether you’re aware of this but that was one of the moments for me where something pretty important clicked into place. Equality and mutuality, our shared values right there, side by side. Communication as the basis of love was another thing. 

Elie: I was telling her that I’m really looking for a partner—not a fling, not a one night stand, not the boyfriend girlfriend thingy, but a mutual, equal partnership. She just kept on looking at me. When I mentioned the part about equality and mutuality, I sensed that it really struck a chord with her. 

The part that stunned me was when she said, “That’s why we are here—to see where this might lead us.”

To me this meant we’re here to see where this can go, where we can go! 

It was like when you’re needing a document to be signed then stamped, and suddenly it’s signed, stamped and also sealed—that’s when the deal is done and for me that moment signified our deal being done. Finished! 

We hiked up and then found ourselves under a tree encircled by many other trees. We lay our blanket down and were snacking on fruits and vegetables as we sipped our wine. The sun was slowly setting between the mountains and we were watching it.

Marlena: We were talking about our connection and relationships with people and I can’t remember what it was that he said which triggered it but just like that, my tears started to roll down my cheeks and I found myself crying! That was the first time in a very long time that I’d cried in front of someone and not only that, I was crying in front of someone that I’d only seen once before. What he was talking about was something that I’d been longing and craving for so profoundly that I was uncontrollably moved. 

I’m not even sure if you were aware just how much your words touched me and how fully overwhelmed I was.

Elie: You were speechless!

Marlena: I was totally speechless! It stunned me into silence!

I always take my time to get to know the person and I really weigh my thoughts and think twice before imparting them to someone. I’m not the kind of person who’s that emotional with anyone, especially if I’ve just met them. But with you, I just started crying. I couldn’t believe it!

Elie: We kept going deeper and deeper. She would ask me a five second question and revealing my answer in full would last maybe half an hour or two. I spoke so much that eventually my head started to ache. 

I finally said, “Listen Marlena, I followed your lead and gave you all that you want. I really respect that you are a reserved person who keeps things in and you need time to expand and open up but now it’s my turn. Tell me about you…”

She slowly started to open up. 

Very slowly!

She started telling me about there being someone else in the picture but she couldn’t quite get the words out, not because she was hiding anything, it was more like she wasn’t sure what she was saying was valid anymore.

Marlena: Well, I couldn’t feel my boyfriend anywhere within my inner world at the point. This connection I had with Elie was already flooding all that space within me, flushing anyone else out of the picture.

Elie: As I listened, I was getting the impression that for her this relationship was like her attempt at embracing the generic picture of life that society throws at you and trying to make it fit: By the age of thirty I need to be married, we need to own a home, he should be working, I should be cooking and we should have kids because we need to fit in.

Marlena: A little while later, as we were watching the sunset somehow the mood and the energy just changed and I can’t remember what you said but we ended up kissing.

Elie: Yes, we shared a kiss. 

Finally, it was around 8:30 so we decided to move. We bounced down the mountain.

The discussion about there somehow being someone else went on just a little bit longer and was concluded with her saying something along the lines of, “Give me some time about that.” 

Would you like to be ‘us’?

Elie: We were now back in the city walking towards the busy Pekini street where I was going to see Marlena off to the bus. 

Just before she got on the bus I said to her, “Marlena, you have asked me many questions and I have given you everything that you have asked for. Do you still have questions?” 

She said, “No.” 

I said, “I believe you now know everything you need to know to establish something with me. I’m just waiting for your message to tell me if you are in with me. If it’s a no, the black-and-white applies for me, I don’t do gray.” 

The black and white is really how I live my life, so give me white smoke or black smoke—done! It was up to her now.

Marlena: I was fascinated when he asked me that, I loved it! 

But I was also very confused! 

The fact that he was only going to be here just one more month and I would need to stay a whole year longer was very present in my mind.

It was also confusing to me as I was still officially in a relationship. No matter how increasingly unhappy I’d been with the person I’d been seeing and how incredibly intrigued I was by this person that I’d just met, that fact was still there hanging right over my head, weighing me down. 

I stepped onto the bus. I was getting out of my notebook while looking at Elie. I was feeling completely drawn to him, extremely mystified by him and super surprised with myself as I’d never had this uncontainable bubbling feeling inside me which was so explosive that I’d needed to get it out and write it down. 

I looked down for a tiny little while to start writing and when I looked up again, he was gone…

I thought okay just like that, he’s gone…

Elie: Abracadabra!

Marlena: It was a wide open main street and he was nowhere to be seen, he’d simply disappeared! I don’t think I ever told you this but I actually do this often; I watch when you leave… I always do.

Elie: I sometimes feel it and I catch her.

Marlena: Only sometimes.

Well, that feeling of him just being gone, being out of sight only made him more present in my mind. 

Everything Elie said inspired me.  

I wasn’t willing to give up the conversation. 

I wasn’t willing to stop communicating with him. 

I felt there was so much more to this story, something that was keenly pushing me towards exploring things further him.

I needed to get to know him better, to have more of him. 

I suggested meeting again on Saturday, which was about two days later. It was nice and sunny so he suggested that we meet in Vake park. 

Elie: I was very much looking forward to getting out of the city and immersing myself in the forest. I thought it would be nice to take her on the same hike I’d done the morning of the day I’d met her. 

Marlena: We were supposed to meet at 10 am. I got to the park and I put away my phone. I’d been journalling a lot those days so I was writing as I waited. I felt that I hadn’t had time to catch my breath for a long, long time so I was looking forward to having some time to myself. And I was, of course, also very much looking forward to spending time with Elie again.

Around 10 to 10, Elie messaged me saying that he would be running late. Elie absolutely hates being late, he detests it, but I didn’t know that at the time.

Elie: Being more of a face-to-face person rather than the messaging type and also having a natural aversion to cell phones in general, I messaged her and told her I’d be there in half an hour and I switched off my phone to focus on the situation I had going on.   

Something important had come up and I’d ended up being the person in the middle who had to coordinate everything amongst a few of my friends, a court case, a medical report and a doctor. Long story! So I was a total of an hour and fifteen minutes late to our date. 

When we were done, I said to my friend, “You’re driving me to the park but I do believe I’m hiking alone,” because if I were in her shoes, I wouldn’t have waited. 

Personally, my maximum wait time is 15 minutes. By the 20th minute, I’m really concerned yet on the 21st minute I’m out of there. I don’t stay for anyone. 

So at this point, I’m looking at it from my perspective and am absolutely sure that she’s not there anymore. 

Marlena: I, on the other hand I was lying down on the bench, enjoying the early spring sunshine, journalling and contemplating my life. 

I was also thinking that maybe he’s just not reliable when it comes to being on time but I would wait, I didn’t mind. I have friends that make it a habit of being even two hours late sometimes, so I’m used to waiting. I figured there was probably something going on which was stopping him from being there and that was okay with me. 

‘He’ll be here when he gets here,’ I thought and didn’t feel the need to worry or to text him back.

Elie: I finally got there fully expecting her to have left. But then I saw her! Wow, she was still there! 

I started to apologize from meters and meters away, “I’m so sorry! I’m really sorry! I’m sorry, don’t get mad at me, I’m really sorry!”

She said, “How are you?” 

I kept going on and on, “I’m sorry! This is not me, this is not how I am! It was my friend’s fault please understand, not mine. A thousand times sorry!”

Marlena: He didn’t know that I’d really been enjoying spending quality time with myself. And things come up, people get delayed—I knew that and I didn’t mind it one small bit. If he could have, I was sure he would have been there on time.

I was already relaxed I was surrounded by nature. I didn’t go into any negative thoughts and had said to myself, “Even if he doesn’t show up, I will still enjoy myself. I’ll do other things that I like to do on this nice Saturday. I’ll just have to do them on my own.” I was still enjoying getting to know the city, especially that part of the city. 

But all of that aside, I just knew deep in my heart that he was going to be there.

Elie: That’s how our date began and it lasted almost thirteen hours. Everything was in slow motion.

Marlena: We spent the whole day talking. From 11 am until 1 am the next day.

Elie: I wanted to bring her flowers but since we were hiking it wouldn’t be practical to bring her a bouquet. I needed to bring something that really represented my feelings so I found a tulip, complete with the root, and put it in my water bottle on the side of my backpack to keep it alive. I also had to position her carefully so that she’d always end up to my right and wouldn’t see it before the right moment presented itself.

Marlena: He was so smooth about it that I never noticed. I was busy focusing on the trail and was also completely immersed in our conversation, so I had no idea.

We walked up to the other side of the mountain. We took a small detour, went down this valley and saw a placid stream where the spring poured into a little canal. We decided to take a break there. 

Elie: I love being barefoot so we took our shoes off and connected our feet to the earth and were relaxing. 

It was the perfect moment!

I said, “Marlena, close your eyes please,” and she said, “Okay,” and closed eyes.

I brought the tulip out and placed it right in front of her and said, “Please open your eyes,” which she did…

Marlena: Tulip is one of my favorite flowers!

Elie: I didn’t know that.

Marlena: I adore flowers! The times that I’d been given flowers was very limited and it was always a bouquet or something dark which I knew wouldn’t last long. Cut flowers are nice to look at, of course, but watching a flower grow is something completely different. This particular tulip was on the verge of blossoming and still had its roots so that it could be planted. 

So I was really delighted, touched and overwhelmed, I didn’t know what to say! I knew there were appropriate words for moments such as these yet I had no words, absolutely none! They had completely deserted me! Again, I was completely speechless because of him—I’d lost my alphabet, I’d lost everything, and that wasn’t the first time I lost my alphabet around him and I still do…

Elie: We planted it on the other side of the canal. It was symbolic for us—to plant something beautiful together and set our intention for it to grow and blossom. 

Then we laid out our fruits and were snacking on them as we continued talking. 

There was nothing around us except for the birds, a soft breeze and the cooling stream.

Marlena: Just the sounds of nature and Elie and me.  

Elie: That’s when we felt the power of the magnet pulling us towards each other. The torso was calling out to the torso, the body was calling to the body and suddenly we were kissing passionately. We were in this great setting—very natural, very romantic—it was brilliant!

Marlena: We were very connected.

Elie: Our kisses got even more heated and soon we didn’t have our tops on.

In the natural flow of things, at times like these, your animal instincts take over and the urge to go further and further arises. But sometimes, you get this other feeling that overcomes that instinct—this feeling of deep connectedness with your partner that is way deeper than anything physical. This feeling uplifts you to a space beyond that lust and you find yourself at a point which is so much higher, so much more profound than any human instinct that the idea of sex feels quite elementary compared to the this connection that you are feeling. And suddenly, sex is not your aim anymore—you have surpassed above and beyond and transcended to bonding on a level that feels really quite divine. 

It was in that elevated state of being that I was able to open my eyes and connect with her eyes. They were so bright and had so much depth in them, they had so much to say, it was as if there was like a  whole documentary going on behind them. I was able to meet her in such intuitive depth that I was able to see way into her soul through those eyes.

Marlena: Things that he couldn’t see until then.

Elie: Then I stopped. I was already hugging her but I held her tighter and said, “You want to say something. Don’t worry, I’ve got your back.”

Her body was leaning into me, her warm skin on mine. 

I kept rubbing her back and holding her and holding her and holding her. 

Marlena: It was a really big moment because Elie was holding me and looking at me and I was  looking into his eyes and I could feel there was something inside me that was moving higher and higher and higher. 

Elie was gently guiding me saying, “You want to say something, say it…”

Elie: I felt the words, they were rising and rising.

Then all of a sudden, she looked at me and said…

Marlena: “I love you.”

Those words flowed out from such a deep place that I didn’t even know I was saying them until I had finished saying them. This surprised me as much as it surprised him and it was just as true then as it is now. 

Elie: Something went bang in her mind. 

I love you! 

It was just the second time we hung out but there they were, those words. 

I rubbed her back and said, “Don’t worry, I’m with you.” 

Her second sentence after that was, “I’ve never said this to anyone.”

Marlena: I hadn’t.

Elie: So it was a double boom! It was boom and then boom again! 

“You are a 26 year old traveling adventurer, and so am I, and you’ve never said these words to anyone?” 

She said, “No.” 

Marlena: I never felt that there was a person that made the sentiment arise which might have triggered that expression out of me. There had never been an occasion which I felt the words were well-placed and valid in any context so I’d never said them to anyone before.

Elie: Although, I don’t consider myself a very romantic kind of guy, I, on the other hand, had said those words before to the women in my life. So, I knew the taste of that. But now when I say, “Marlena, I love you,” the taste is completely different—the taste of saying something that you really mean has a different flavor to it. 

Looking back and comparing the taste of the two flavors, I can say that when I’d uttered those words before, I’d been faking it. This was not done in a deceitful, calculated way since the first person I was lying to was myself. I can see that the words were said those times just to have a woman next to me, someone to share my moments with. Now I know the difference. 

Suddenly, some hikers appeared out of nowhere and we had to quickly pull ourselves together and pretend we were just sitting down, taking a break from our hike. 

Marlena: Thank God that they were far enough for us to make ourselves presentable again.

Elie: We packed up and continued to hike between the cedar trees and the small Georgian village beyond them. 

The conversation we had then was one of my favorite ones. I loved everything we discussed because Marlena and Elie had now become ‘us’ and my life and her life had merged and it was now ‘our life’. 

We were discussing how we would make this work, where we were now and how we were to plan our shared life going forward. We took what she wanted, what I wanted and talked about how we could merge it into one and do something we both wanted. 

Then we started discussing marriage.

To me, what people refer to as ‘marriage’ doesn’t exist! 

Two people will stay together with or without a piece of paper signed in front of some man who represents some government or church. 

From what I’ve seen, the difference the paper makes is that when you sign it, people remain together even if they are unhappy because of the children or the money that will be taken from one of them or the government will be creating obstacles or because the church will deem you to be a sinner. 

What good is that paper if nobody is happy?

But when you are happy, you will remain together for decades and decades, despite any paper, contract or document. The thing that keeps you together is the connection and the love, as it should be. And if those are not there anymore, any of us can open the door and leave.

We don’t need a piece of paper to tell us, “Elie, you love Marlena and Marlena, you love Elie.” 

She knows I love her. 

We get married. Twice. In four months.

Elie: Saying that, we did get legally married about four months after meeting just for ease of logistics and for being able to live together and travel around the same countries. 

But to us, our real marriage took place this one magical night. That was the night our souls merged in marriage.

Marlena: It happened way earlier than our legal marriage.

Elie: We’re jumping here but I’ll take you to this night. It was before we even moved into our own apartment. She was still living in a shared flat. I don’t recall what happened earlier that day but I do remember that night. 

Marlena: It was on a full moon.

Elie: Full moon and way past midnight.

Marlena: It was also during a period where we went to bed really late and woke up really early. We woke up at the same time in the middle of the night. That happens to us quite a lot actually. Happened on that particular night too. Suddenly we were both wide awake.

Elie: You know when you sleep your soul leaves your body. When we woke up we were like zombies because they hadn’t returned yet.

Her room was very spacious and had a big window. The moonlight was streaming in through it and casting its light on both of us. We always have a blanket on the floor because we always eat sitting on the ground, so we sat there. We were cross-legged and facing each other. We were very close.

Marlena: We were sitting apart from each other but very close. We were touching each other, but it felt like we were not touching each other. It was strange.

Elie: I was looking at her and she was looking at me and we were talking. I wouldn’t be able to tell you the words or sentences that were spoken but there was a very high intensity of connection. 

Marlena: What I recall is looking into Elie’s eyes and sharing emotions, experiences and stories. I don’t remember the content but we had never been like that before. We were sharing our deepest selves. That’s where we both opened up fully and where we feel we fully committed to each other and our souls merged into one being.

Elie: Every night is special but that night was a particularly remarkable night for us. And this is where I committed to Marlena and she committed to me.

So, by the time we got around to signing the marriage documents, we considered ourselves already merged on a spiritual level. We were already as married as two people could be.

A life of nature amongst the trees

Elie: Back to our date. I was telling Marlena my dream for my future. I had worked for ten years of my life and studied for four of those. But that system was not something that felt right and I had consciously decided to step away from it. I did not want to engage in money. This was not how humans are meant to live. I wanted to go back to living more naturally. 

I told her that mother nature provides all that we need. Water is free and abundant. I didn’t want electricity. We could have internet, but no wifi. Would she be okay with a cabled connection? She said yes. Fair compromise. But our phones always had to be off or on flight mode. 

I wanted to live in a cob house just like people had lived for centuries. Our food would be provided by mother earth: we would eat what we planted and plant what we ate. 

Would she be okay with all of this? 

She said that she would. 

I told her to really consider this seriously because it really wouldn’t work if she asked me to move into an apartment somewhere in the city in five years. That was definitely not an option. 

“No changing deals on me, are you aware of that?” 

She said, “Yes.”

She added her inputs on top of mine and our shared vision started to take shape. Our dream now is to have a caravan to roam all around the world volunteering everywhere until the universe tells us, “This land is to be your home,” and we will settle down there. Until then we need a home that can move around the world with us to discover what this world is all about because we really haven’t seen anything.

Marlena: And the countries that we have seen separately, we want to revisit so that we can experience them together. 

Elie: Although I don’t want to go back to the system, we do need resources to buy a van and make our dream come true so if we do have to spend a few years in the system to be fully prepared and build up our resources in order to fully step out again with everything we need, we will take those steps. 

We both needed a bit of modification to merge the two motorways of our lives into one without losing ourselves. Nobody should lose themselves for someone else, but we actually managed to merge well because she is like me, but in a different shape, and I am like her, but in a different shape, and these two shapes merged and fit into each other very easily. 

Marlena: It’s interesting how we always form parallels, even when it comes to how we grew up and how we were raised.

Elie: It’s incredible—how she comes from Northern Germany and I’m from a certain region in Lebanon but we have been raised in the exact same way.

Marlena: Right down to the calcium tablets we were given as children.

Elie: We had the same way of dealing with people, same way of practicing life, how we slept, when we slept… And we both sleep and wake up much earlier than others so it is quite an uncommon parallel to have.

Marlena: Our parents also had very similar ways of parenting.

Elie: And they are all still together and the way they love, bicker and kiss in the same way.

Marlena: And at the moment they are all going through the phase of having to cope with their children transitioning into adulthood and leaving the nest.

Elie: Saying that, they are all equally thrilled that Marlena and I have found each other.

Marlena: I started opening up more and told Elie things I’d never told anyone. We delved into other practicalities and  discussed things like our approach to money. The more we spoke, the more similarities would pop up.

We had a wonderful chat about day-to-day living and how we were going to do it because there was no way we could figure out our life together if we were not actually living together. 

Elie: That was my first condition—if we are really going to be partners in life, there is no way that I live somewhere and you live somewhere else—we had to live in the same space, otherwise how will I really know you and how will you really know me?

Marlena: We talked and talked, we were discovering so much about each other. 

Elie: Finally, we hiked all the way back into town.  We bought some cucumbers, carrots and tomatoes, sat on a park bench and had them as dinner. Saturday had now turned into Sunday as it was around 1 am when we finally said goodbye. 

Goodbye my past, hello our future.

Marlena: And that was the same Sunday which I broke up with the guy that I was dating. 

I’d put it off it as much as I could but it was time to accept the fact that something needed to be done, it was long overdue. I don’t like dealing with these kinds of situations but my mind was clear now and there really was no other option but to have that conversation. 

When I was around Elie, I felt more like myself than I had in months, if not years. Elie had very organically infused himself into my thoughts, heart and life just by being himself. There wasn’t a trace of anyone else anywhere within me anymore. It did take me a lot of strength to have that conversation with my ex but when I did, it also paradoxically felt very natural, like all the correct words had finally found their rightful places.

We only spoke once more after that and this time the conversation was very genuine and sincere. 

For me that was a very good ending. I feel it was the first time we actually had such an open and deep conversation. I very much value what each experience teaches us and feel that living through that gave me a unique and rather powerful perspective in terms of contrast when I met Elie.

Elie: I do believe that relationship she had was an important step which she had to live through before she met me.

Marlena: It was preparation.

Elie: Just like my ex in Turkey was preparation for me. She was so different from me—she ate meat, she smoked—these are things that I totally disagree with. Back then I was on the road and exploring both the outer world and, unavoidably, my inner world too. It was my experience with her that led me to the clear understanding that I have today. 

What I saw was that each relationship brings you a basket of things. You see that some items in the basket—number one and two and three—you are okay with. But then you see other things in the basket which don’t agree with your soul. You realize that while you can still practice kindness and acceptance of others and their journeys, you can extend the same compassion to yourself and get clearer on why you think what you think, what you expect from love and what your non-negotiable principles are. So you look at the basket and know what you want but the rest, you throw them out. 

By the time my journey with my ex was over, I’d thrown out all that did not agree with my non-negotiable principles—black or white, no gray in here. 

But if I hadn’t had met her, I would be going around in circles, still wondering about various items in the basket that each relationship offers and if I could embrace them or not. By the time Marlena and I crossed paths, I was very clear because I’d had a great lesson. So we were both prepared and ready to meet.

He came over and he stayed… forever.

Elie: Our next meeting was to be Tuesday. She invited me over to her place for dinner and I ended up cooking.

Marlena: You took over the cooking.

Elie: And you didn’t complain. I knew she was testing me to see if I was good in the kitchen and that’s why she was okay with it.

Marlena: Well the ritual of cooking is important to me. I really enjoy preparing everything side by side without too much talking. It’s like having an unspoken mutual agreement about how to go about practical things. And I saw that we blended well in the kitchen too, so that was good.

I was in a flat share and we had dinner with two of my friends. Then we headed to my room for a glass of wine and that was the first time that he was in my personal space. 

We walked up the stairs and entered the room from a separate outside entrance. A lot of traditional Georgian houses are set up that way. 

What followed was another important moment for us. See, the first thing I do when I’m about to enter my house is take off my shoes. This is something I grew up with. It makes a lot of sense to me and I’ve always done it.

Elie: Taking off shoes is not something I have grown up with. I grew up with a Christian family in Lebanon and they all wear shoes indoors, so it is not something in our tradition. 

If you think about it from an aspect of cleanliness, taking off shoes is logical to keep the dust and dirt out. But I also believe that the energy of the ego is underneath the shoes and bringing shoes into the house carries bad energy with it. And that’s why you keep the shoes outside. This was a practice that I had embraced in India, where I started my ongoing habit of first deconstructing then consciously rebuilding everything about me during my spiritual rebirthing process there.

Even when I go to visit my parents my mom still says, “Why do take off your shoes? We don’t,” and I say, “But I do.” Done! It’s important to me. And here Marlena was taking off her shoes on her own accord!

Something inside me said yes!

Marlena: I stepped into the house. I turned on the lights just for long enough to light my candles and then I turned them off again. I just don’t like those bright lights plus the power in that old house had a habit of not working very well so I used candles instead.

Elie: “Bingo!” I yelled inside, “She’s the one! Yes, she’s the one! I swear I can see that I’m not going to leave you—you are my The One! Done!”

See, I’m very sensitive to electricity and WiFi. I feel it in my head—candles don’t hurt, light from the fireplace doesn’t hurt, but electricity does hurt and I hadn’t come across anyone else who felt as disrupted by it as I am. Here she was first taking her shoes off then lighting candles by default! 

It might sound like a mere practical detail but these little tiny things, especially when coupled with all of the big things, they count a lot, otherwise we might as well be roommates or flatmates and I’m not looking for that. I’m looking for a partner in life and there are different requirements for that and if these small things which complement the big things aren’t there, you can’t have a proper life of partnership together. So seeing her so naturally do these small things that people would never do, things that were so important to me, was like confirmation over confirmation.

Marlena: It was a lovely evening. It was also the first night we lay next to each other so we were trying to adjust. When Elie eventually went back to sleeping in his natural position and I went back to sleeping in my natural position, we saw that even those matched!

Elie: I found that sleeping in the shavasana position really allows my energy to sink into mother earth and grounds me and that’s how I sleep. And her way of sleeping is on her right side with one leg bent and the other straight.  And if you put them together, they fit just like two pieces of a puzzle! And that’s another clue that life will work well when you’re together.

Marlena: He stayed with me the night.

Elie: And I never really left again. Soon we moved into another little house together. Our lives had fully merged into one, done!

Learning to live together—the black and the white of it.  

Marlena: Apart from a small break we had when Elie was in Armenia for his vipassana, we were now living together and figuring out our lives as ‘us’. It was the first time I was experiencing living with a romantic partner. We did have a few ups and downs.

Elie: And some huge volcanoes.

Marlena: Once, he actually left!

Elie: Yes, I left! We’d had a fight and I told her that this was crap, that I couldn’t go on and that I was out!

Marlena: We’d barely slept that whole night, it was horrible.

We were in the same room but emotionally miles apart. 

I felt like a stranger to myself. 

I had no appetite, my mind was dull, everything was blurry. 

My whole being felt scattered. 

Elie: In the morning, she opened the door for me in tears and I left! 

Marlena: My landlady was very specific about our shared living areas and how to lock up so I had to see him out the door and off he went with his black-or-white view of life.

He’s the kind of person that when he leaves, he leaves and he was sure that he wasn’t going to see me again. 

Elie: I don’t look back, I just carry-on.

Marlena: And he made that very clear to me but I had no other choice: I loved him but I didn’t want to continue life with him if we were not going to live happily, so I let him go.

Elie: And those were her words to me as I was leaving, “I am letting you go for your own sake. Just go…”

Marlena: I watched him walking down the street getting further and further away from me. He had all his things rolled into a small backpack and he was getting smaller and smaller with every step. I watched him until I couldn’t see him anymore…

I had to go to work that day so I had no choice but to continue to get ready as if everything was okay but I was a complete mess inside. 

Saying that though, I also had this incredibly strong feeling that we were not done. Whether it was going to be just one more meeting or just one more conversation, I really felt that I was going to see him again.

Well, Elie is very black and white and also very prompt so he immediately blocked me on Facebook and on everything else that he could block me on.

Elie: To me, she was done, this matter was done, so it was a case of, don’t look back, just carry-on.

Marlena: No lines of communication open.

Elie: No, I don’t do that kind of thing.

Marlena: I was completely beside myself and very troubled. Trying to get through the day in the office was torturous. Yet, that feeling I had wouldn’t go away. ‘This is not it, it can’t be!’ my gut kept saying and I held onto that with everything that I had. 

There are only a few places that he frequented and I was convinced that, if nothing, I would bump into him in one of them.

Elie: She knows my spots.

I went back to the other house that I’d been staying in before moving in with her. My mind was trying to process all that had happened. 

You’ve been fulfilled, you’ve been happy, she’s lovely! But she has some characteristics that don’t appeal to you and some aspects of her mentality don’t suit you…

My thoughts concluded, ‘I really like you, but I prefer myself. Just bye!’ 

That was just fine! I would continue to walk along my path and carry on searching for what I was looking for. Fair! 

Then I sat down to have my breakfast… 

I was eating the things that I always ate, but something was wrong. 

I ate apples but I couldn’t taste them! 

I ate from the same apples we’d bought from the same guy the day before. Yesterday, that apple was amazing—it’s the same fruit, the same redness—but that day, it was tasteless!

I moved to the same bread that I always eat, but the feedback from my mind was that it was tasteless.

I was eating everything and everything I ate was tasteless. 

I was breathing but I didn’t feel my breath. 

The water is lifeless, the apple is nothing. 

She was out of my life and everything had lost its flavor.

Of course, this had nothing to do with the apple or the bread and everything to do with me…why analyze it again? It was as clear as anything.

I said, “Universe, please! What’s going on? What am I to do?” 

I stepped back and I meditated and then the feeling came to me: text her. 

Whatever I do, I do stubbornly but on the other hand I’d been honest with myself my whole life and I wasn’t going to lie to myself about anything ever.

So I texted her.

But, of course, I first had to unblock her to be able to do so.

Many angry messages were pouring out of my fingers, one after the other.

Marlena: I started receiving one furious message after the other. He was so angry! 

Elie: After two hours I said to her, “Listen, we miscommunicated a lot. There is a lot I would love to say to you and I don’t know if you also have something to say to me but I need your opinion on what I want to say to you. Would you like to meet up again?” 

Marlena: The implication was that it would be the last time we see each other.

Elie: I could see that she’d read all my messages but there was no reply. ‘Okay, that’s it!’ I thought, ‘I’ve lost her…’

Marlena: And he couldn’t have been more mistaken. I was in the office and not replying because I had lost all my words again. I was trying to figure out how I could transmute my feelings into mere language, how I could possibly respond to such angry statements, complete with numerous exclamation marks and screaming capital letters, adequately so that none of my feelings got lost in translation.

I needed to find my words and I was still searching for them. 

Elie: And here I was assuming that I’d lost her. 

Marlena: So believing that it would be the last time that we were to meet, I said yes.

Elie: Well, it was more like , “Yes, I’ll follow you wherever you are.” 

Oh, okay, wow!

I responded saying, “Looking forward to it.” 

There is a tree in one of the mountains we used to go to just above one of the big parks in Tbilisi. I said we’d meet up there. We both had always felt a deep connection to the big old tree.  

Marlena: And so we met. And we talked and talked.

Elie: Communication can be both the lock but also the key for everything!

Marlena: We talked it all out and we cried it all out.

Elie: Both of us.

Marlena: And we held each other, our hearts connected once again.

Elie: And then, boom—the magnets are back! Since then we have had a few more volcanoes erupting but they are getting smaller and smaller.

Marlena: Yes, that first one was the most intense one!

Elie: Here is the thing—both of us are masters when it comes to communicating with each other, so we never miscommunicate. But we have seen that she has a tendency to assume things sometimes and that’s when the volcanoes start to bubble. I always say. “Just knock on the door then and ask if there is anything behind it. Don’t assume.” 

When we increased the communication and she decreased her assumptions, the conversation transformed into, “Oh, is this what you wanted? Because I assumed this other thing because…” and thus those assumptions were not given a chance to cause chaos again.

The more we discussed things in detail, the more we discovered that issues could be like clouds—from the outside they look big and overwhelming but once you step inside, they’re nothing. 

 And anytime we deal with any challenges we use this ‘communication without assumptions’ recipe. Now that doesn’t mean that we don’t ever have issues.

Marlena: Of course we do.

Elie: But we’ve realized that most of these struggles are based on our reactions but once we realize that and apologize, we kiss and makeup.

Marlena: We listen to each other to understand.

Elie: Instead of listening to reply! That’s quite an important difference there.

So you can tell me something and I’ll let you speak so that I can tell you this in return. No! 

Listening carefully to understand what she’s saying is different than listening to hear a pause so I can throw words back at her and be the victor. This is not a contest, we can both win, we need to merge.

Marlena: We think of our relationship as ‘The Us’.

Elie: Sometimes I’ll say, “I am not really looking after The Us,” or, “You misbehaved with The Us.” This is how we refer to it it. We are both deeply committed to The Us and are working towards making this project a success. Simple!

We do the travel test.

Marlena: We figured out very soon that we live together well. Now we needed to figure out if we also travelled with each other well.

Elie: We were good at home, but would we be good outside of the home? This was quite important because of the plan we have of traveling the world in a van.

Marlena: So during our summer break we travelled all over Georgia for five weeks only using hitchhiking to get around.

Elie: We covered 2,400 km using our thumbs! 

We discovered that whilst we do wonderfully with each other indoors, we are even better when we are outdoors. Traveling also cemented the fact that we were indeed not just great lovers, but also the best of friends.

Marlena: Now with that also tested and out of the way, we will head towards the next phase of our lives together—we have to move The Us back to Germany after my contract in Georgia is over. 

Elie: I have a few languages in my basket—French, English and Arabic—but not German so I’m learning that now.

Marlena: We will find a place where we both have a good chance of finding jobs, where we can also do some community gardening—a place where we can grow together and meanwhile save up as much as possible for our dream-project of putting our lives into a van. That’s what we’re working towards together. 

My dream and our destiny.

Marlena: I believe in destiny and I believe this was our destiny.

It’s rare, but sometimes I have very vivid dreams where I catch a little glimpse of the future weeks or months or even years before it actually happens. And many years ago I believe that I actually caught a glimpse of my life with Elie in a dream.

Elie: Yes, sixteen years ago!

Marlena: I must have been around ten years old when I had it and years later, I matched the dream with reality when it happened. 

This was when I was still renting a room in that big house. It was one of the first nights that Elie slept over. Everything felt heightened—emotions and sleep patterns. Everything was intensified, amplified.

Elie and I woke up in the middle of the night at the same time for no reason and looked at each other. 

Elie: As always.

Marlena: It was dark so I didn’t really see much except for vague silhouettes. Elie was saying something which I can’t remember now.

Elie: We were sitting on the edge of the bed. 

Marlena: You were behind me hugging me in a very special way and that’s when I got that feeling of déjà vu. 

Elie: She’d dreamt about me. Although I was very vague in her dream when she saw it, the feeling was exactly the same. 

Marlena: I recognized it very clearly at that moment—that dream that I’d had way back when I was a young little girl! It was crazy but it was also a confirmation of destiny. So we were in the right spot then and we are in the right spot now, heading towards where we want to be. 

~ ~ ~ 

Update:

This interview was conducted in the pre-covid era. Marlena has since completed her assignment in Georgia and headed back to Germany to prepare the nest until Elie wrapped things up and joined her. When the travel disruptions began in the beginning of 2020, they ended up on separate continents for most of the year. What they did share though was much love, yearning, a bit of frustration but also a lot of patience to carry them through. 

I’m very happy to report that they have finally moved their ‘The Us’ to Germany.

In Marlena’s words, “We are living in Bonn, Elie has joined me in the apartment he found and I moved our things into. I am working already, and Elie has already settled in legally with all loose ends buttoned up. He’s also started his German lessons. 

We are really astounded by how much we have changed since we last met, and since we’ve talked about our story. Elie and I have talked about how differently we’d be sharing this story today in contrast to back then, when we were still very new to our shared life. 

These days however, we are navigating wonderfully, and with a lot more understanding, more compromises, and deeper love, and joy. 

We’re happy, very rested, and our life is going according to plan. With regards to our van-life, we’re working on that dream to become reality. And so far, so good.”

(Interview & write-up by Bianca)

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